A Study in Babylonian and Assybian Archaeology
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XVI GESTURE IN SUMERIAN AND BABYLONIAN PRAYER A STUDY IN BABYLONIAN AND ASSYBIAN ARCHAEOLOGY BY S. LANGDON, PH.D., PROFESSOR OF ASSYRIOLOGY, OXFORD ELIGIOUS worship is abundantly illustrated in R many of its most important aspects by scenes engraved on Sumerian, Babylonian, and Assyrian seal cylinders. Chronologically the seals of this region illustrate nearly every period of the long history of these peoples and the changing rituals and beliefs of their religion. A very large proportion of the seals represent the owner of the seal approaching a deity in the attitude of prayer. This is especially true of the glyptique of Sumer and Akkad, where the proportion of this type of seal to all others is much greater than in Assyria. In the northern empire the Assyrians are not so much attached to the scenes of worship, but even here this motif is well represented. The engravers of cylinders in all periods probably kept in stock seals engraved with the scene of the private prayer as the custom imposed in their periods. The human who is figured standing before a god, or in Assyria more frequently before a divine symbol, is not a portrait of the owner of the seal. The owner regards himself rather as represented and symbolized by the conventional figure. In those cases in which the engraver produced a seal cylinder at the command of a Sumerian or Babylonian, perhaps, we may regard the praying figure as an approximate portrait. That scenes of this kind are standardized products of the various Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. University of Warwick, on 20 May 2018 at 01:28:38, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00053296 532 GESTURE IN SUMERIAN AND BABYLONIAN PRAYER periods representing the religious ideas, but not actual portraits, is proven by Cassite seals of women on which a male figure takes the place of the worshipper.1 The example of a portrait of a woman worshipper on Ward No. 536 would in itself prove that the praying figures on Babylonian seals actually represent the owners. But even more direct evidence for this important fact may be adduced. The Aramaic traders and adventurers who settled in Assyria and Babylonia in great numbers in the late period adopted the cylinder seal. They obviously purchased these from Assyrian and Babylonian engravers, whose designs are purely of the accepted type. The owners probably cared nothing for the religious symbolism and scenes on the seals. They worshipped other gods and adhered to other forms of religion. But in many cases these Aramaic citizens of Assyria caused their names to be inscribed in Aramaic letters beside the design. On the seal reproduced here (Fig. 1) from about the seventh century B.C. we have typical Assyrian symbols. Winged genii adore the winged disk of the sun-god. The owner of the seal stands supplicating the forked lightning, symbol of Adad, the thunder-god. Beside the design is written in Aramaic, "Jarp'el, son of Hur-'adad." To ensure the identity of the figured person the engraver repeats the name (which is engraved very closely beside the figure) " Jarp'el ". This evidence adds a very important fact to our knowledge of Babylonian religion. The praying figures on seals actually represent the owners. Of that we can no longer doubt. Sumerians, Babylonians, and Assyrians carried about on their seals representations of themselves as they said their prayers before one of the great gods. 1 Ward, Seal Cylinders of Western Asia, No. 536, is an example of a1 portrait. The seal belongs to the woman Meuarubtum and the praying figure is a woman. But see Collection de Clercq, 262, seal of Ussurtum with male figure in the scene. See also ibid. 265, seal of Tdh-nis-resi. Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. University of Warwick, on 20 May 2018 at 01:28:38, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00053296 GESTURE IN SUMERIAN AND BABYLOXlAN PRAYER 533 These were supported from the neck by a stout cord which passed through an aperture at the axis of the cylinder. I propose here to study the various attitudes of the worshipper's hands in the different periods, and to compare these attitudes with those which characterize the worship of adjacent peoples. The early period of Sumerian glyptique, commonly known as pre-Sargonic, lias generally the so-called processional scene. This will be illustrated by Figs. 2, 3, 4, and 5. Seals of this type represent the owner conducted into the presence of a great seated deity by his own personal god, who leads his protege by the hand. In case the procession moves from left to right the man's god or goddess takes the worshipper's left hand. In the reversed direction the man is led by the right hand. By this design the artist brings the disengaged arm nearest the observer. Occasionally the disengaged arm is employed to carry a lamb or kid as an offering. On Fig. 3 the owner is conducted by his goddess. On Fig. 2 an attendant brings the animal sacrifice; the reader will observe that this attendant approaches with the right arm extended and the fore-arm raised parallel with the face, palm inward. Observe also that the conducting deities approach with disengaged arm raised in a similar manner palms inward. On seal Fig. 7 three deities approach the seated grain goddess. The central figure (a goddess) of these three has the most ancient attitude of prayer for humans, the raised hand palm inward and the disengaged arm folded at the waist. These are all extremely archaic types extending back to a period as early as 3500 B.C. From them we conclude that man when not conducted by a deity stood in the position of prayer described above. This is apparently the original prayer attitude of prehistoric man in Sumer. For this attitude of primitive man see also the following extremely archaic seals, Delaporte, BMiotheque Nationale, 51, 53, 59; Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. University of Warwick, on 20 May 2018 at 01:28:38, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00053296 534 GESTURE IN SUMERIAN AND BABYLONIAN PRAYER Ward, 90, 91, 302; Delaporte, Musee Guimet, 25, 26; Collection de Clercq, 83.1 Although such was the orthodox pose of adoration in the most ancient times a few exceptions from the same period should be noted. Fig. 6, a product of the engraver's art well toward the end of the pre-Sargonic period, say 2900 B.C., shows the human with both hands folded at the waist. His god, double-faced, and goddess precede him in the ordinary pose of the period. On a much more ancient seal, Musee Guimet, 23, the owner stands in the same attitude, both hands at the waist. A seal to be placed at the end of the archaic period has two humans, a bearded Semite owner of the seal attended by a Sumerian priest (?). The owner is in the second pose, and so is an inferior deity who stands behind the seated goddess (drawn double vis-a-vis). The priest has the orthodox position with the modification that the palm is not turned inward but faces the left (De Clercq, No. 82). This later modification of the ordinary pose will be seen on Fig.'8. The hand is thus brought into such position that the narrow surface on the side of the little finger is turned toward the deitjr. It is possible that the seals Figs. 7 and 8 may be assigned to the period of Sargon and Narain-Sin. The second or Sargonic period of glyptique, say 2800—2600, does not introduce the scene of adoration and prayer to any great extent. Scenes from the GilgamishEpic are by far the most common here. On a seal of Naram- Sin, Rev. d'Assyr., iv, 11, the praying figure has the older orthodox position. To this period belongs the scene of a row of inferior deities adoring the seated sun-god (Delaporte, Bibliotheque Nationale, 72, 63, 64). The deity who heads the procession has nearly the old orthodox pose, the others have the secondary position with both 1 Seal of Gimil-l-U-su , . li Mz-luh-ka-ki, "(jimililisu tlie ... of Meluhha." Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. University of Warwick, on 20 May 2018 at 01:28:38, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00053296 GESTURE IN SUMEKIAN AND BABYLONIAN PRAYER 535 hands folded at the waist. Both attitudes, therefore, obtain in the religious rituals of early Sumerian and Semitic civilization. For the Semitic pose in prayer the cylinders prove nothing, for this people simply adopted the Sumerian custom. It will be seen that the custom of raising the hand palm inward was apparently the most ancient and universal, that is, the kiss-throwing hand. Judging from those scenes in which both poses appear, one is induced to believe that the hands folded at the waist indicated an attitude of great humility and penance. The lifted hand, on the contrary, would lay the emphasis on adoration and salutation. The third period of glyptique includes the seals of the (•schools of Gudea and Dungi, roughly 2600-2358, or down to the end of the dynasty of Ur.1 If we may make inferences from the two seals of Gudea (Figs.